The invention relates to an arrangement for setting back the seat of an equestrian saddle, the latter being held at the front by stop means cooperating with the shoulders of the horse and optionally being fixed on the horse's back by a girth whose ends carry strap buckles cooperating with girth straps fixed on the saddle, and to a damping device adapted to be fitted to the arrangement.
The saddle is held on the horse's back by a girth which passes over a very precisely defined zone of the horse's body known as the girth line, towards which zone the saddle tends to reposition itself because of the morphology of the horse. In order to prevent the saddle from being displaced in the forward direction, it is provided with paddings serving as stops and supported in the hollows of the shoulders. The seat is then generally positioned vertically in line with the zone centered on the ninth dorsal vertebra, and the latter has to support the weight of the rider.
The position of the saddle is too far forward in relation to the centre of gravity of the horse, and workouts or training are intended, among other objects, to develop a musculature capable of compensating for this unbalance and to enable the horse to regain its natural gait.
Unfortunately, workouts for young horses end too often in a restriction of shoulder movement. It is not rare for a rider to be disappointed because his horse has lost a part of the good stepping which it showed in the meadow.
Practically all these animals have the same bone injury consisting of a blockage of one or more of the vertebrae of the withers (dorsal vertebrae 3 to 8). Study of the vertebral column of the horse (FIG. 1) leads to two findings: the apex of the curve of the vertebral bodies is at the 13th and 14th dorsal vertebrae, in which zone the top line is at its lowest; the shortest spinous processes are those of these same vertebrae.
The rider's weight is applied to the horse at a point resulting from the position of his seat and of the attachment of the stirrup leathers carrying the stirrups. When the horse is not sufficiently muscular, the rider's weight tends to weigh down the zone of the vertebral column situated under the saddle.
For the reasons explained above, the position of the saddle (FIG. 2) is such that the weight is applied at the 9th dorsal vertebra and the entire withers zone is weighed down, because the vertebral processes in that zone have a natural forward dip. Because of the great length of the spinous processes of the withers, the slightest lowering of this region brings them into contact with one another and gives rise to symptoms of interspinal osteoarthritis. This condition is very painful and is then self-sustaining, while the pain results in a reflex spasm of the muscles of the intervertebral joints.